Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 1): Zeus god of the bright sky (Cambridge, 1914)

Attic Festivals of Dionysos 689

this objection I would reply, first, that when Aristophanes penned
his play in 425 B.C. comedy had already invaded not only the
Lenaia (at which the Ackarnidns was produced) but also its pro-
vincial counterpart the Rural Dionysia1. Authors and inscriptions
alike attest both comedies and, more often, tragedies as held at
this festival2. Secondly, I would point out that in Aristophanes'
play the procession marshalled by Dikaiopolis leads up to a climax
in which he is murderously assaulted by the Chorus. They spring
upon him from an ambush, crying 'Pelt him! Pelt him!3' and
declaring that they hate him more than Kleon, whom they mean
to cut into pieces4. Now we lose half the fun of the situation, if
we fail to realise that this is a travesty of the sparagmos or 'rending'
of Dionysos by the Titans. It is, of course, always difficult to
know when one has got to the bottom of an Aristophanic jest.
It may even be that in Xanthias attacked by the Acharnians, the
'Fair'-man by the charcoal-burners, we should recognise a tragedy-
turned-comedy resembling our own rough-and-tumble between the
miller and the sweep5.

1 The 'AcrKcoXiaa/xos, in which the competitors balanced themselves on an inflated
goat-skin, standing the while upon one leg (Sir W. Smith in Smith—Wayte—Marindin
Diet. Ant. i. 209 f., E. Saglio in Daremberg—Saglio Diet. Ant. i. 472 f., E. Reisch in
Pauly—Wissowa Real-Enc. ii. 1698 fif.), recalls the use of the Aios Kdodiov, upon which
persons stood to be purified supporting themselves on their left foot alone {supra
p. 422 ff.). Perhaps the 'AovcwAtacr/^s too originated as a serious rite, designed to
bring the celebrants one by one into contact with the skin of the sacred beast. Ac-
cording to Hyg. poet. astr. 2. 4, Icarus (sic) slew the he-goat that had cropped his
vine-leaves, inflated its skin, and made his comrades dance round it—-whence the line
of Eratosthenes 'iKapiov iroal irpQra irepl rpdyov Copxw^vro (supra p. 678 n. 4).

2 Mommsen Feste d. Stadt Athen p. 355.

3 Possibly the pelting received by Aischines as an actor (Dem. de cor. 262) is to be
connected with his performance at the Rural Dionysia (id. 180, 242).

4 Aristoph. Ach. 280 ff.

5 Dr L. R. Farnell in the Journ. Hell. Stud. 1909 xxix p. xlvii and in his Cults of Gk.
States v. 130 f., 234 ff., continuing Usener's fruitful investigation of the Macedonian festival
ra Ea.vd<.Ka, i.e. EavdLKa (Archivf. Rel. 1904 vii. 301 ff. = H.Usener Kleine Schriften Leipzig
and Berlin 1913 iv. 4386°.), has argued that the tale of the Boeotian Xanthos slain by the
Neleid Melanthos with the aid of Dionysos MeAcu'a^is (schol. Aristoph. Ach. 146; cp.
schol. Plat. Symp. 208 D, who calls the Boeotian Xanthios and does not mention
Dionysos) presupposes ' an old Thrako-Greek mummers' play in which a divine figure
in a black goat-skin kills another divine figure who is the fair or bright god.' Dr Farnell
holds that this play was properly a vegetation-masque performed in the winter, which,
attached to the goat-god qua vegetation-god in his own northern home, was carried
through Greece by the Minyans (Melanthos as a Neleid was a Minyan, as were the
^oXoetj and 'OXeZcu of Orchomenos in Boiotia (Plout. quaestt. Gr. 38)), acquired variety
of motif as it spread from village to village, reached Athens via Eleutherai, and ulti-
mately became the parent of Greek tragedy. This important contention cannot be
discussed in a foot-note. It certainly contains large elements of truth, and has not,
in my opinion, been materially shaken by Prof. Ridgeway's criticism (W. Ridgeway
The Origin of Tragedy Cambridge 1910 p. 73 ff.). But here it is in point only to quote

C.

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